Photo by Viggo Beck
Parasaurolophus Song
maybe like a saxophone played
through cranial crest, crooning
heartthrob blues, but scaled up,
so much bigger than us, we assume
they ruled the earth.
maybe like a bull elk bugle, a teenage beast
moaning horrible and horny
for sweet company, sounding
a cretaceous yawp
to burlier baritone candidates.
maybe like a semi-truck— i hear you
roaring down the highway, your blood
burning in the tank of the world,
stopping for nothing,
not even meteorites.
maybe like a death wail
before addictions, priests, and poets.
we called you by our names, so many undead
skeletons and renderings screaming
from behind glass and plastic
i was real, i was real.
Jasper Beck grew up in rural Oregon and is graduating with honors from Western Oregon University. He received the 2023 Peter Sears Prize for Poetry and the 2024 Edna Meudt Memorial Award from the National Federation of State Poetry Societies. In addition to writing, he enjoys singing with the a cappella group The West of Us.
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